


Possession

by yaskween



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst and Humor, Angst with a Happy Ending, Angsty Schmoop, Blow Jobs, Canon Compliant, Episode Related, Eventual Smut, Fluff, Hand Jobs, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Mutual Pining, Season/Series 04, The Dubcon doesn't go far, WHAT IS THIS SHOW, Wow so much schmoopier than I intended
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-12 07:20:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18006362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yaskween/pseuds/yaskween
Summary: The Quentin before him hesitated in an unreasonably good impression of the real thing, and then seemed to take Eliot’s greeting as an invitation to sit next to him on the stairs. Eliot felt the warmth and weight of him as if he were real. He guessed that was because he had a pretty clear memory of the real Quentin’s warmth and weight beside him. Fifty years’ worth of memories, he corrected himself.“Honestly? I don’t mean to be rude,” Eliot started, having trouble meeting Quentin’s eyes again. “But I don’t think I can handle being this close to you right now.”---This fic is basically a speculative episode of late season four, with possible plot and possible future smut and definite spoilers for the whole show so far. It also includes a scene inspired by "Practical Magic," so fair warning for copious homages.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [annalikesfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/annalikesfic/gifts), [luna101](https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna101/gifts).



> NOTES:  
> This fic is dedicated to my friends @annalikesfic and @luna101, who have been stalwart companions in this wild fandom time as we cross the rubicon from slash fangirls to fandom grandmothers.
> 
> Although this fic is more or less a speculative episode that would take place near the end of season four, I’ve tried to keep it as canon-compliant as possible, because oh wow do I love the canon. But my theories about where the Enyalius storyline is going are just that: my theories.
> 
> Comments and kudos always super appreciated, thank you for reading!
> 
> ETA: Wow wow wow, @GRock87 wrote this fic a sequel here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18103415

“Listen, Jules, I think I found something,” Quentin said, holding a book up for Penny 23 and Julia to see. It was a crumbling yellow manuscript, its pages very possibly made of papyrus, and it was in Ancient Greek. “The spell I used to translate it is a little unstable, but in the _Argonautica_ , right, there’s this story of Jason--”

“The guy who got the Golden Fleece? Wasn’t he a king?” Penny 23 interrupted.

“Yeah, he’s a hero, and I think he’s maybe a demigod, or at least, distantly related to Hermes,” Quentin continued. “Anyway, he’s given these stones by Enyalius--”

“The god the Monster is looking for?” Julia asked.

Quentin nodded. “And the stones have the power to cause discord, and start a war among all these factions of Greek soldiers--”

 “So you think this Monster wants to, what, use the stones to start World War Three?” Penny 23 asked, incredulous.

Quentin looked up at them soberly. “That’s exactly what I think,” he said.

“But if that were true, why does he need more than one of them?” Julia pointed out. “In the Golden Fleece story, doesn’t Jason only need one rock to throw, to start the war?”

Quentin shrugged. “Maybe more stones make the impulse to, I don’t know, blow up the entire world a little stronger.”

“Then we can’t let him get more,” Julia said firmly. Quentin looked like he’d been kicked.

 “So if the Monster isn’t using the stones to build a body,” Penny 23 began slowly, finishing the thought for everyone in the room, “Then what happens to Eliot when he’s done?”

* 

Eliot sat on the staircase of his mind palace, which was a particularly halcyon replica of the Physical Kids Cottage. Sure, the booze was an illusion, and the inhabitants just versions of his own happiest memories, but every now and then he could trick himself into thinking for a few seconds that everything was fine and exactly as it used to be. _The Happy Place_. The feeling never lasted very long; most of his time was spent trying to figure out the Monster’s secrets without getting killed by the murderous creatures outside. They’d killed Charleton, finally, which had hit Eliot harder than he would have expected. Charleton had been decent company, if for no other reason than the fact he was the only part of this place that wasn’t some part of Eliot’s subconscious mind. Eliot hadn’t known what to do with the body, if it was a body (it wasn’t), and before long it had just faded creepily into thin air. That was more frightening than almost anything else he’d seen lately, and he’d seen more than his fair share of horrific spectacle.

Eliot had never liked his mind that much. It was a good mind; he knew he was smart. You had to be brilliant to get into Brakebills, let alone to survive a couple of years there without blowing yourself up. And hadn’t he been a good, wise king? He hoped so. He missed Fillory. He missed Margo. _No._

But the parts of his mind Eliot had carefully tried to avoid were all he had here, in this weird liminal space. He’d never considered what it would be like to be possessed before now. Was this how it had been for Mike? _No_ , Eliot reminded himself. _We don’t think about Mike_. Every time he focused on someone from his past for longer than a few moments, they would materialize in front of him, a corporeal memory that usually wanted to have some kind of existentially painful conversation with him, and he was not in the mood for another one of those. He didn’t know how much time had passed, time was impossible for him to measure in this state, but it felt as if he’d just revisited every repressed memory of his life, and now was not the time to ruminate on the possessed ex-boyfriend he’d had to kill.

Horror films had always made it seem like the person possessed was totally gone, absent the consciousness of the being using their body, but Eliot found this situation so much worse. He was here, but he was… impotent. He had to _wait_. And as much as the drama of being a damsel in distress appealed in the abstract, in practice it was somehow both dull and terrifying. And if he were honest with himself (which, why not, there was nothing else to be _now_ ), it was also a bit mortifying.

His friends were probably working themselves sick trying to save him, Eliot thought, not for the first time. The thought didn’t make him particularly happy, especially because he wasn’t sure it could be done. But if anyone could…

This time, it wasn’t the Quentin who’d fought Penny who appeared in front of him. _That_ Quentin was long gone, sacrificed to the creatures in some distant memory to which Eliot had sent him. This Quentin was the one he’d only glimpsed for a second, in a park. He thought it was a park, anyway, he hadn’t had much time to look around. This Quentin was wearing a blue collared shirt, his hair shorter, his eyes bright and sad.

“Eliot?” Quentin said, in the same certain voice he’d said when Eliot had opened the door. Eliot drank him in, studying him. He hadn’t meant to manifest this Quentin, especially not while worrying so much about him, but his mind palace was weird that way; intention didn’t have to be entirely conscious.

“Hey,” Eliot replied, exhausted. He’d said it more out of habit than because he wanted to have yet another conversation with himself in the form of a friend. _Or whatever they were,_  he thought darkly.

The Quentin before him hesitated in an unreasonably good impression of the real thing, and then seemed to take Eliot’s greeting as an invitation to sit next to him on the stairs. Eliot felt the warmth and weight of him as if he were real. He guessed that was because he had a pretty clear memory of the real Quentin’s warmth and weight beside him. _Fifty years’ worth of memories_ , he corrected himself. 

“Honestly? I don’t mean to be rude,” Eliot started, having trouble meeting Quentin’s eyes again. “But I don’t think I can handle being this close to you right now.”

Quentin just stared at him with the same manic hope Eliot had glimpsed for a moment in the park. He wished he could go back to see it again in person. Quentin’s face was open, shocked. His lips were parted and he looked like he was about to say something important.

“See, that’s what I’m talking about,” Eliot said, chuckling without much mirth. “When you look at me like that… It’s just,” he swallowed thickly. “I can’t touch you--”

Quentin rested his chin on Eliot’s shoulder. “Sure you can,” he said gamely, with the same chutzpah Eliot recognized from the last time Quentin had kissed him.

Eliot laughed hollowly. “Not the way I want to touch you. You know what I mean. You’re not… you aren’t real.” He braved a glance at the Quentin nuzzling his shoulder, and cleared his throat. “As much as I like the idea of you torturing me, Quentin, this version of torment is not _really_ my idea of fun.” 

This time it was Quentin’s turn to laugh. “I know you think about me,” he said simply, shrugging a little. “I know you’ve been fantasizing about me since my first day at Brakebills. How is this, you know... any different?”

“That is not true,” Eliot said, indignant. Quentin just looked at him with an expression that clearly said, _Liar._

“Okay, once or twice,” Eliot admitted. "But you don't know that." 

“Try 32 and a half times,” Quentin corrected. It was deeply annoying that somewhere, his mind had been keeping count. He had no idea what the “half” time was. A buried memory for a different day, perhaps. Eliot glared at him. “All I’m saying is,” Quentin started, unbuttoning the top of his shirt, “It’s not like it would be _wrong._ ”

“It would be _so_ wrong,” Eliot countered, shaking his head and covering his eyes with his hands. “I can’t believe that my life is in danger, actual mortal danger, and all I can think about is you seducing me.”

Quentin shrugged again. “What else are we going to do?”

Eliot rolled his eyes. “Let’s just save the earnest dirty talk for real life, okay?”

*


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m... hungry,” the Monster informed him, sitting down next to him on the bed as Quentin scrambled to sit up. “What does this body like to eat?”
> 
> “You’d know better than me,” Quentin said sulkily, gesturing to the empty Cheeto packets that littered the floor.
> 
> “Not that kind of hungry,” the Monster mused, staring at Quentin’s chest. “Take off your clothing.”
> 
> “What?!” Quentin asked, exasperated. “No.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for some dubcon seduction attempts from the Monster. I think he's been behaving kind of questionably in canon, so it felt IC, but this is not particularly smutty, as Quentin doesn't go for it. Feel free to skip if that squicks you!

Quentin didn’t know when he’d last slept a full night’s sleep. Every time he dozed off, the Monster would wake him, asking for an update on their mission. But now, feeling a familiar sense of betrayal at Julia and Penny 23 for the blasphemous suggestion that they give up on saving Eliot, there was nowhere else he wanted to be except a bed. He’d thrown the book on the couch and stormed off to one of the loft’s smaller bedrooms, hoping they wouldn’t follow him. They hadn’t.

He plopped down on the bed, fully clothed, and stared at the ceiling. The choice, Julia had explained patiently, was to help foment World War Three on the off chance that they could rescue Eliot from inside the Monster, or find a way to kill him with Eliot trapped inside. Quentin couldn’t believe those were their choices, but Penny 23 had sided with Julia.  _ Of course he had _ , Quentin thought miserably,  _ because he wants to fuck her _ . He wished Margo or Kady or even Alice had been there to offer some kind of third path they could take, but neither he nor Julia could come up with one. Finally, he’d retreated with a wordless sigh of frustration, knowing he had to remove himself before fighting any further about the fate of his best friend.

 

_ His best friend _ . Quentin turned the phrase over again and again in his mind, the way he had ever since they’d remembered their key quest at the mosaic.  _ Eliot’s my best friend _ , he thought hopelessly.  _ I don’t even care if that’s all. I just want him back _ .

There was a moment-- a brief moment, no more than a few minutes, really-- when Quentin had thought maybe they could be something else to each other. In the rush of feelings that overwhelmed him back at Castle Whitespire, one stood out: he loved Eliot, and they’d been happy together. He had always loved Eliot, but a part of him had always been wary, too. Quentin was not particularly used to trusting happy thoughts.

_ “What if we… gave it a shot? Would that be that crazy? Why the fuck not?” _

Eliot had told him why the fuck not. Quentin tried to block out the memory, but it was persistent.  _ “You have to know that’s not me and that’s definitely not you, not when we have a choice.” _

But then he’d seen Eliot for a split second in the Monster, the real Eliot, who had fought god knew what just to tell him, _ “Peaches and plums, motherfucker. I’m alive in here.” _ And he’d quoted Quentin, too, just to make sure Quentin knew it was really him.  _ “Fifty years. Who gets proof of concept like that?” _

Quentin hadn’t told anyone about that conversation. Not because he was embarrassed-- it never felt great to be rejected, but that wasn’t really it. It just seemed too intimate a moment to share offhandedly; he’d never found the right time, amidst being memory-wiped and then chasing the Monster around the world, to tell Julia the whole story, and he’d barely had a minute to get a private word in with Margo since they’d returned to their regularly scheduled lives. So many things were painful now: Eliot’s absence, the Monster’s murder sprees, Alice. What had happened with Eliot had hurt him badly, but he’d spent the better part of a year getting over it. He’d had to; there had been keys to find, magic to restore, and then there had been a monster in a castle he’d decided to spend eternity guarding. But Eliot had ruined that, Quentin thought angrily. Eliot didn’t want him, but he didn’t want anyone else to have him, either. 

_ “I didn’t actually agree on anything, but I did decide that one of my best friends wouldn’t spend the rest of his life locked in a prison, guarding what turns out to be a really not so scary monster.” _

Quentin buried his head under a pillow. He’d gone over this ten dozen times. 

A light touch on his back startled him. “Go away,” he said gruffly, turning to the intruder. But it wasn’t Julia or Penny 23.

“Away?” The Monster asked, hurt. “Where is Away?”

Quentin sighed. “Never mind,” he said. “I thought you were someone else.”

“Eliot?” The Monster inquired, his tone characteristically bitter.

“No, no,” Quentin replied quickly, afraid of what the Monster would do if he thought he’d been expecting Eliot. He found it hard to meet the Monster’s eyes now, knowing that Eliot was still inside, maybe even close to the surface. He was afraid to see him again, and more afraid he never would.

“I’m... hungry,” the Monster informed him, sitting down next to him on the bed as Quentin scrambled to sit up. “What does this body like to eat?”

“You’d know better than me,” Quentin said sulkily, gesturing to the empty Cheeto packets that littered the floor.

“Not that kind of hungry,” the Monster mused, staring at Quentin’s chest. “Take off your clothing.”

“What?!” Quentin asked, exasperated. “No.”

“Fine,” the Monster shrugged. With a small hand gesture unlike Quentin had ever seen, the Monster watched as Quentin’s shirt evaporated on his skin. The air was cold as it hit his exposed body.

“No,” Quentin repeated firmly. He wasn’t scared yet, just exhausted. Sometimes the Monster acted like a particularly perverse child. And he’d liked that shirt. “That’s not how we treat friends,” he said, struggling to keep his voice level, folding his arms across his chest.

“Mm, I think it is,” the Monster replied, leaning towards him. “I think this body wants something from you, Quentin.”

Quentin’s eyes watered for a moment. He couldn’t believe that after weeks of being tormented, the Monster still had the capacity to hurt him like that, and surprise him while he did it. Quentin had given up hope of escaping this entire rescue attempt alive, the day the Monster had nearly choked him to death. But he’d thought that by giving up his own will to live, he’d somehow be stronger in the face of the constant little cruelties the Monster with Eliot’s face and eyes liked to inflict.

“I know you don’t mean it,” Quentin said slowly, “But you are hurting me right now.”

“I hurt too, Quentin,” the Monster said, rubbing his hand (Eliot’s hand) down the front of his jeans. Quentin closed his eyes.

“You can do that if you want,” Quentin explained, eyes still closed. “But you have to do that alone, okay?” He opened his eyes to find the Monster pouting.

“I thought friends helped,” he muttered darkly, and disappeared.

*

Eliot wasn’t sure what to do, so he did what he used to do when he had no better options available to him: he threw a party.

Todd was there, and Margo, and even Alice and Penny made an appearance. The Quentin from earlier sat quietly on the staircase, observing the party with the same caution that the real Quentin reserved for demonstrations of young people having fun. From the dance floor, Eliot sighed and rolled his eyes. “I can’t believe I feel guilty about rejecting a figment of my imagination,” he told Margo, heading towards the bar.

“What?” She yelled over the music, continuing to dance. She looked incredible, as always.

Eliot mixed two drinks, unsure of what the effect would be now that he knew the whole Cottage was an illusion, and brought one over to Quentin.

“Okay, fine,” he said, handing him the blue concoction. “I get it. You want my attention.”

Quentin shrugged, taking the glass gingerly, his gratitude clear. “I always want your attention.”

Eliot didn’t bother to dignify that with an answer. Did memory!Quentin always have to be so maudlin?

They drank in silence as Ariana Grande blasted through the house.

“Do you-- do you want to take a walk?” Quentin asked him.

Eliot looked cautiously at the door. “It’s a little dangerous out there, Q.”

Quentin nodded. “I’m thinking of a safe place, actually.” He put his glass down, and held out a hand to Eliot. Eliot looked at it skeptically.

“Okay,” Quentin said softly, and walked up the stairs. After a moment, Eliot followed.

They walked down the second floor hallway until they came to Eliot’s room. 

“I can’t believe you’re still trying this,” Eliot smiled with admiration. “I’m flattered, but--”

Quentin shook his head. “I’m not trying to seduce you,” he said. “I just wanted to show you something.” Noises came suddenly from the other side of the closed door. Eliot blanched.

He could hear Margo’s voice through the wall. “He’s really not okay, and he just doesn’t care,” she was saying. It sounded like she was close to tears.

“We’re gonna do whatever we can,” he heard Quentin say. Suddenly he was inside the room, watching as Margo leaned over to kiss Quentin, as he himself woke drowsily behind them on the bed. This night, he remembered. It was oddly over-saturated, as if the colors in the room had all been dialed up to eleven. The emotion bottle hangover must have colored this particular memory. He vaguely wanted to leave, but the door was closed.

“I didn’t think you liked me,” Quentin was saying as Margo kissed her way down his neck.

“Take this off,” she murmured, struggling with his shirt. The memory Eliot raised himself on an elbow to watch as Eliot in the present tried not to. “I don’t really like you,” Margo was saying, straddling Quentin now. “But he does.” She’d gestured to Eliot. 

“I know,” Quentin had replied, his eyes closed. “I don’t know why, either.” Eliot knew where this was going. He decided maybe he did want to watch, actually. He’d visited this memory briefly with Charleton when he was trying to find his door, but not this exact moment. He’d visited the morning after, when the guilt had come crashing down. This scene was painful, sure, but also meaningless. They hadn’t been in control of their emotions. He had felt badly later, but not during it. He’d barely been aware of what was happening.

Now, as he watched, his younger self pinned Quentin’s wrists against the headboard, kissing his way down his chest until he reached his boxers. Margo lapped at Quentin’s nipples. 

“Yeah, okay, I can’t do this right now,” Eliot called through the door, rapping on the door and trying the handle. He needed to get back into the hallway, back down to the party. He couldn’t watch more of this, his past self fellating Quentin with such obvious tenderness. He’d been so raw and drunk that night that he hadn’t even bothered to put up a front of not wanting exactly this. He’d wanted it, and Quentin had wanted it, and Margo… God, this felt tacky, spying on his own sexcapades, but some part of him must long to be here, he rationalized, in this memory, for whatever reason, otherwise he’d be able to leave.

“I’m not getting naked until I know which one of us you’re going to fuck,” Eliot in the memory said. Quentin’s mouth dropped open.

“Do you-- do you think you can-- I mean, if I--?” Quentin had stammered. Eliot looked at him, really looked at him, and for maybe the first time registered how needy Quentin sounded, like he had never been fucked before, and maybe he hadn’t really. 

“Stop,” Eliot said out loud. The three of them froze and looked at him, affectless, motionless except for their eyes. “I’m sorry, I can’t let you keep doing this.”

“But it’s fun,” Margo whined coquettishly. 

“I know, Bambi,” Eliot said. “But I don’t think it’s healthy for this whole thing,” he gestured at them, “to take up so much space in my mind palace that I can’t even use my own bedroom to sleep.”

Quentin nodded. The other two just stared at him blankly. Eliot had a sudden headache.

He rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand. “Do any of you know where the aspirin might be found?”

*


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of smut, angst, plot, and more pining.

“I found a spell that might break the Monster’s hold on Eliot,” Julia was saying, holding a teal leather volume out to him. Quentin watched her mouth shape the words but he was barely registering them. “It would take… a hugely talented magician, maybe two or three.” She paused. “We’d have to ask Alice for help.” They were gathered in the kitchen of Kady’s loft. No one had seen Kady in days. Penny 23 sipped a thermos. Julia left a salad untouched in front of her. Quentin wasn’t hungry. “Let’s be real here, Q, she’s the only one who can help us.”

“Not true,” Penny 23 muttered under his breath.

“What?” Julia asked, whirling on him.

“Alice is not the most powerful magician we know,” Penny 23 started. “You’re a freaking goddess, for fuck’s sake.”

“I’m a powerless demigod,” Julia corrected him.

“Penny’s right,” Quentin said, turning the idea over in his mind. “The only thing keeping you from using magic is the cloaking spell the Library and the Dean cast to protect you from the McAllistairs.”

“Right,” Julia replied, “So…”

“So what if we broke it?” Penny 23 interjected. “What if we broke the cloaking spell? Then you’d be at least as powerful as Iris, right?”

“Iris, who the Monster killed in, what, ten seconds?” Julia pointed out.

“She didn’t know he was coming,” Quentin offered. “We do.”

“I don’t know,” Julia said slowly. 

“C’mon Jules,” Quentin pleaded. “The McAllistairs are nothing compared to what’s going to happen if we don’t fix this.”

Julia turned to him, gaze steely. “This spell,” she started, pointing at the Aramaic, “Isn’t going to kill the Monster. It might separate him from Eliot, but then what? We don’t have a plan for what comes after.”

Quentin bit back his frustration. “So we’ll deal with that when we get to it,” he said simply. “We separate the Monster from Eliot, and Eliot can help us--”

“The Monster can hop bodies,” Penny 23 reminded him. “We save Eliot, great, then he possesses one of us. We need a better gameplan.”

Quentin let out an exasperated sigh. “We’re running out of time!” He said, trying not to yell and failing. Julia and Penny 23 exchanged a loaded look. “It’s only a matter of time before the Monster does something stupid and kills Eliot and then he body-hops anyway!”

Julia bit her lip and looked away from him for a moment. “Q’s right,” she said, to no one in particular. “The Monster could kill Eliot at any minute. All he’d have to do is walk in front of traffic again or eat something toxic by mistake.”

Penny 23 nodded. “Seems to me like we have to find something to capture the Monster in when we split him out,” he said slowly, thinking out loud. “If we can find… a container, something that would keep him in one place, maybe…”

Quentin nodded. “Like a niffin box,” he said.

Julia raised her eyebrows with a small smile, shrugging as if to say  _ I told you so _ . “See? We need Alice.”

*

Eliot had never liked being alone, which was one of the reasons he’d bonded so quickly with Margo. She was the same way. People who hated being left to their own devices tended to find one another. But he couldn’t seem to conjure her, or anyone else, while he was in this peculiar mood. He had a headache. It was a rather cruel quirk of being possessed that the headache felt real and the painkillers he’d found stashed in his subconscious felt fake.

He found himself more desperately alone than he’d ever been in his life, in his bedroom in the Physical Kids Cottage, or whatever simulation of his bedroom in the Physical Kids Cottage this was. It looked like his room back during second year, when he’d molded the Golem as a way of visiting Brakebills while ruling Fillory. He’d had a nice, if spectacularly bizarre, fling with an exchange student named Javier in this room. That had been one of the weirder nights of his life, and-- he reflected now-- very probably the night Fen had gotten pregnant.

He tossed and turned in the bed. He couldn’t remember if he’d ever really slept in this illusion. The whole ordeal felt like one long, uninterrupted fever dream.

Back in his real life, he hadn’t been sleeping well either. Not since the quest for the seven keys, if he were being honest with himself. Not since spending an alternate lifetime in Fillory. He’d gotten terribly used to sharing a bed. Even as old men, he reflected, he and Quentin had shared a pallet by the mosaic. It hadn’t always been sexual. It was just how he’d gotten used to sleeping, year after year, until he’d forgotten what it had been like to sleep alone. He hadn’t had to for decades.

Then they’d come back, to their timeline, and of course they’d gone back to sleeping separately. It didn’t occur to him to try anything else. He wasn’t exactly alone, either; some nights, when he was at Castle Whitespire, he slept beside Fen, but that was very different. She was a sweet, soft presence, and he admired her deeply, but he’d never quite gotten used to waking up beside her. 

And Quentin-- he wasn’t sure. He’d thought Quentin had probably gone off and slept with the first girl who threw herself at him, and there were always girls throwing themselves at him. For an unassuming nerd, he was absurdly good-looking, and the fact that he didn’t know it made him like catnip to a certain subset of overconfident women, who viewed him as something of a project. It was like he was begging you to convince him he was worth wanting.  _ Not just by women _ , Eliot corrected himself.

He turned over again, seeking the cool side of the sheets, and started to find a lump in the bed beside him.  _ Of course _ , he thought bitterly. He’d spent too much time reflecting on this particular memory.

It was Quentin from their first anniversary at the mosaic, his hair long and tied back, his clothes dingy with age and use and sun exposure.  _ To our first and last year at this thing. _ He was sleeping peacefully, barely making a sound, curled towards Eliot. He snuffled quietly and moved closer in his sleep. They’d been a little drunk, Eliot recalled, and Quentin had kissed him in the firelight, barely bothering with a muttered preamble. Eliot had been genuinely surprised, and more than a little delighted by the turn of events.

“I didn’t want to make the first move,” he whispered out loud to the sleeping memory. “I don’t think I would have forgiven myself if you’d said no.”

“Mm,” Quentin kept his eyes closed and squirmed closer as he came awake. He would be spooning Eliot before long. “When have I ever said no to you?” He murmured sleepily, sounding genuinely confused.

“Good point,” Eliot huffed out a small laugh. “You’ve never been able to resist my charms, Coldwater.”

Quentin smiled with his eyes still shut, then opened one to look up at Eliot. “Um,” he said shyly, rolling closer until their bodies touched. “How much of this night do you remember?”

Eliot watched as Quentin shifted lower, slinking his hands down to Eliot’s hips and pressing their bodies together, the way he had then. Eliot’s breath hitched. It felt real, but somehow unstable, like an old-fashioned television signal going in and out. He couldn’t focus too much on their actual situation, or the anxiety of his being trapped overwhelmed him. Focusing on the memory made it sharper. This one comforted him.

“You get confident when you drink,” he informed the memory. “It’s a little cliche, but I didn’t mind.”

“I get confident when I drink,” Quentin echoed, leaning up to kiss Eliot gently. “Like this?”

Eliot put his hand on Quentin’s jaw, closed his eyes, and guided their mouths back together to kiss him back. “More or less,” he murmured. When he opened his eyes again, they were back at the mosaic. He watched Quentin kiss his past self in the firelight, a quilt beneath them, his hand on Quentin’s. “I don’t know what I expected,” he said ruefully, taking in their surroundings as he leaned against the ladder for a better view.

“Hey, can we maybe, um,” Quentin was saying, pushing his hands between their bodies and snaking his warm fingers down into Eliot’s underwear. Eliot’s breath caught in his throat as he watched. This memory was crystal clear, down to the insects buzzing in the night air.  _ Why not _ , he relented. It was  _ his _ memory. He relaxed, letting the ladder support his weight, and watched Quentin go down on him. It was like watching porn, almost, except for the part where he could literally see his past self catching feelings.

“Jesus, whatever you want,” his was saying in the memory, looking down at Quentin through eyes that kept fluttering closed. He remembered forcing them back open. He’d wanted to take in everything, just in case this was the last time, or his only chance. Now he watched as Quentin pulled off, taking off his clothes, and his past self leaned forward to hug him. _ You’re crying. _

Eliot had forgotten that bit of this night; the desperation, the sadness, the futility they’d felt at that moment, the galvanized sense that pervaded the morning after, their shared commitment to finish at any and every cost. The memory flickered and Eliot found himself back at the cottage. “Really?” he said out loud, to absolutely no one. “Unbelievable.” He wished to a bunch of gods he didn’t believe in that he hadn’t blacked out that night.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’d set up an altar, of sorts. A human skull, some chalk markings, red candles, dead camelias, Sumerian glyphs sketched out in charcoal. Alice hadn’t needed much prompting to come back; Quentin suspected she’d just been waiting for an invitation. At the last moment, Margo had been able to join them, too, with a confusing explanation about Fen and Josh covering for her in Fillory. She was dressed in her Fillorian adventuring clothes, still, and no one had bothered asking her if she planned to stay dressed that way in the middle of New York City. Besides, they didn’t need to leave the loft for this.  
> \---  
> I'm just pretending this is an episode. This would be the proverbial climax.

They’d set up an altar, of sorts. A human skull, some chalk markings, red candles, dead camelias, Sumerian glyphs sketched out in charcoal. Alice hadn’t needed much prompting to come back; Quentin suspected she’d just been waiting for an invitation. At the last moment, Margo had been able to join them, too, with a confusing explanation about Fen and Josh covering for her in Fillory. She was dressed in her Fillorian adventuring clothes, still, and no one had bothered asking her if she planned to stay dressed that way in the middle of New York City. Besides, they didn’t need to leave the loft for this.

The five of them stood at each corner of a pentagram they’d drawn as wide as the living room floor: Quentin, Alice, Julia, Penny 23, and Margo. They were warded as much as they could be, having spent two days drawing protection spells around the loft to fend of the McAllistairs and anyone besides the Monster that their magic might attract. Kady had delivered a set of Deweys to them, from unknown provenance, and then promptly disappeared again.

“This is the box,” Alice proffered, placing it in the center of the pentagram. It was covered in Aramaic and looked as if it were painted with a black lacquer that gleamed in the candlelight.

“First,” Quentin cleared his throat. “First we have to break Julia’s cloaking spell. I think her god-magic, or whatever it is, is going to attract the Monster to us as soon as Jules gets her powers back. So we have to be ready with the box.”

Alice nodded at him, mouth a tight line. “It’s ready,” she said, voice shaking a little. “All we need to do is recite the Sumerian spell I’ve written on the altar.” At one side of the pentagram, the charcoal glyphs gleamed on a mirror, surrounded by the dead flowers.

“Then I’ll try to break the possession,” Julia added. “Hopefully my god-powers will strengthen the spell we found.”

“They will,” Penny 23 assured her.

“So, we uncloak Julia, we cast the exorcism,” Quentin began. “Then, when the Monster leaves Eliot’s body, we bind it to the box.” There was a long, tense silence. 

“Anyone want to practice first?” Margo asked the room sarcastically. There was no way to practice the spells without the Monster there, and they only had one chance with the box.

“Okay,” Quentin nodded at them.

With one motion, Quentin, Alice, Penny 23, and Margo raised their fingers towards Julia, tutting the moves in unison to the spell that would uncloak her magic. A lavender haze of light shot into the loft, bathing Julia in its glare, and she lifted off her feet in a horizontal line, floating backwards. Alice gasped, but her hands didn’t drop. Slowly, Julia righted herself and dropped gently back onto the floor, glowing faintly with an indigo halo limning her body. She gave them a beatific smile.

“Okay then,” she said gently, calmer than she’d ever sounded before. She barely flicked her hand, and the black lacquer box drifted into her grasp as she moved to the center of the room. Penny 23 stared at her.

“Hello friends,” the Monster popped up between Quentin and Alice. Margo scowled darkly at him. “I see you’ve brought me… something new.” He cocked his head at Julia, at the box.

“A present,” Julia offered, holding it out to him. The Monster grabbed it greedily as Alice started whispering the incantation. Julia and Penny 23 joined her, tutting frantically. Margo and Quentin did their parts. A buzzing sound, like the wings of a thousand beetles beating the air, started to surround them.

“Quentin,” the Monster said, its outline becoming fuzzy. “What did you do?” It raised its hand as if to cause someone bodily harm, but then it dropped to the floor, and suddenly it looked like Eliot’s body was having a seizure, dropping the box as it jerked on the ground. Margo looked at Quentin, terrified, her fingers still moving. The Monster’s nose-- Eliot’s nose-- started bleeding.

“Stop, stop, stop it,” Quentin shouted, dropping his hands and waving at the others in agitation to get them to stop casting. “Eliot--”

They all listened, some in spite of their better judgment, and dropped their hands in unison. Silent tears fell down Margo’s cheeks as she watched Eliot’s body writhe on the loft floor.

Quentin dropped to his knees and tried to grab Eliot’s hand. He wasn’t sure what he was even doing, but seconds later a force-field knocked him back. He crawled forward again as Eliot’s body grew still.

“No, no, no,” Quentin found himself saying out loud, as he crept closer to the prone figure. “Eliot!” He laid himself down so he was facing Eliot’s face, the invisible force field separating them still pulsing painfully as he moved closer. “Stay,” he whispered, barely aware of saying the word out loud.

From somewhere deep inside of the body, Eliot’s voice came out. “Just let him take me, Q,” he said weakly, his eyes opening onto Quentin’s. They were bloodshot and slitted, as if the effort to reach out of himself was like pushing through stone. “I’ll go, wherever you send him.”

“No,” Quentin said forcefully, pressing his cheek into the hardwood floor defiantly. “No, see, because--”

“Everyone will be safe,” Eliot bit out hoarsely. “Or at least saf _ er _ .” The body twitched spasmodically. For a moment, the eyes rested on Margo, who was visibly shuddering. 

“Eliot…” She said, reaching out to him. He shuddered and closed his eyes again.

“Don’t do this, El, don’t die on me,” Quentin whispered. “Not again, I can’t let you...”

Eliot struggled to the surface, eyes locking on Quentin’s. He looked immeasurably sad. “By the way,” his started, his voice strangled, “It wouldn’t have been that crazy.” And then he closed his eyes.

“No! No,” Quentin shouted, smacking his hand against the floor. Eliot’s body didn’t stir. Quentin sprang to his feet. “Finish the spell,” he said to the room, glaring as if to dare them to do otherwise. Julia nodded, then Alice. They started chanting again, the words that would bind the Monster to the box, fingers motioning rapidly. Quentin started a different spell, a beacon spell, one meant to draw Eliot to inhabit the body that jerked ominously on the floor.

Everything went sideways for a moment. Quentin’s concentration never wavered, but the room seemed to; it spun before his eyes, and blue wisps of smoke started curling out of his hands. “Stop!” he could hear Alice saying, but he couldn’t stop, he had to get Eliot out of wherever he was at the moment the rest of his friends trapped the Monster in the box.

Suddenly, the room went silent and still. There was a sepia tone to the air around him, and Quentin could hear nothing except his blood thumping in his ears. He glowed like a beacon, like Julia, his hands turning blue.

“Q!” Julia shouted, running to him to clasp his hands in hers. The fire in them went out. The room returned to normal colors. Suddenly he could hear a cacophony of sounds: something dripping, something tapping, a creak from the floorboards.

He passed out.

*

Eliot cracked an eye open. He didn’t know where he was. It wasn’t Brakebills, and he was pretty sure it wasn’t a memory. He didn’t remember this room. It was white-walled and high-ceilinged, and it looked like a bougie spread from an in-flight magazine on the best Airbnbs to book for your next vacation.

For some reason he was laying spread-eagled on the floor. Every muscle in his body he was aware of, and some he hadn’t known he possessed, was throbbing in pain. The first thing he noticed was a black lacquer box, glinting beside his outstretched hand. It radiated heat, and Eliot pulled his hand away instinctively.

“El?” That was Margo’s voice, he’d know it anywhere. He tried to move his head, but his neck was too stiff. It felt like a hangover, after spending a month doing strength-training workouts with no trainer to oversee that he was doing them correctly. His back spasmed, and the light was too bright.

“El,” she came to crouch beside him, right in his sight line. “Eliot, are you--?”

He sat up against the pain and pulled her into a tight embrace. “Bambi,” he said quietly, nose pressed into her hair. He’d missed the real thing; the memory version was scentless, too smooth, its edges too soft.

She hugged him back. “I can’t believe it’s really you,” she said warily, pressing him closer. For the first time, Eliot noticed they weren’t alone. He saw Alice staring down at him from a few feet away, her mouth slack, and one of the Pennys glaring around as usual beside her, and behind them crouched Julia, who was bent over a prone figure, weeping and holding her iridescent hands to its temples. _ Oh, shit _ .

He got to his feet slowly, Margo gripping his hand and trying to keep him steady. Alice stooped to grab the little black box, which was emitting tiny chirps and clicks. As Eliot stepped closer he could see little gleams of light were passing from Julia’s hands into Quentin’s forehead, tracking over his skin like fireflies alighting. His eyes were closed and his face was very pale, almost gray. Eliot knelt beside them.

“We-- we don’t know what happened,” he heard Alice say, uncertain. “He was trying to save you and he almost--”

“Niffined out,” Margo finished. “Julia tried to stop it.”

Eliot couldn’t take his eyes away from his friend’s face. “I followed him out,” he said slowly, his voice catching in his throat. “It was like he came to show me how to get out.”   


Alice nodded. “He was trying to do a beacon spell.”

“Well, it worked,” Margo said hollowly, her voice emotionless. She put her hand on the small of Eliot’s back and knelt beside him. “Is he--?”

“I don’t know,” Julia replied, her eyes focused on her work. “I can’t really tell.”

Quentin’s eyes fluttered open. Eliot’s heart leaped into his throat.  “Is he back?” Quentin asked Julia, voice cracking with the effort, and then his eyes rested on Eliot’s face beside hers. He sat up.

“Are you back?” he asked Eliot, bleary-eyed from his ordeal.

Eliot found his mouth didn’t want to form words, so he let it do what it wanted and kissed Quentin instead of answering him, sliding a hand through his hair to keep his head still as he pressed them harder together. He couldn’t breathe and he didn’t care.

“Okayyyyy, so that’s new,” Penny 23 said from somewhere behind them.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You didn’t think I really wanted you,” he said softly, his gaze a playful accusation.
> 
> “No—“ Eliot started to protest, unsure of what to say for one of the few times in his life, but Quentin just silenced him with a suddenly fierce look.
> 
> “I want to convince you,” he said, biting his lip and pushing his hair out of his eyes as he looked up at his friend.
> 
> “You don’t have to,” Eliot replied, sitting up on his elbows and moving slightly so they were facing each other on the bed.
> 
> “Eliot,” Quentin said, his voice a little strangled. “I’m not going to beg unless… unless you want me to beg.”
> 
> \---
> 
> Some porn, and a happy ending we'll never get in this show.

“Where is it?” Eliot said finally, breaking away from Quentin with the small reserve of dignity he had left and looking back at Margo and the others. “The thing that’s been crouching inside me like a little toad?”

Alice held the clicking box out. “We-- we bound him to the box. It’s a Sumerian spell, some Aramaic additions Julia found--”

“And we’re sure this is going to work?” Eliot said slowly, carefully, not wanting to touch the black box.

“No,” Quentin answered shakily, still sitting beside him and looking dazed. “No, but it was our best shot.”

Eliot smiled indulgently at him and stood up, lending Quentin a hand so he could pull himself up. “Your worst guess is better than other people’s best shot,” he said, voice more tender than he’d meant. When it came to Quentin, he realized, he’d surrendered the normal control of his emotions he exercised towards everyone else. He shrugged. “Looks good to me.”

Julia nodded, lips pursed nervously. “The problem now is that I’m a walking target for Irene McAllistair.”

“I have an idea,” Alice said timidly, her gaze on the ground. “What if, what if we make Irene McAllistair the new guardian of the Monster?”

Quentin looked at her. “Send them both back to Blackspire?” he asked, turning the idea over in his mind. “Imprison them at the castle at the end of the world?”

“Exactly,” Alice nodded, a little twitchy as she laid out the plan. “I could cast it. Or Margo--”

Margo met her gaze. “I could take the Muntjac back,” she agreed. “We trap them both and set them back in that dungeon…”

Eliot stared at the box in Alice’s hand. “It was... very lonely.”

“Sooo, you _don’t_ want to trap him back in the castle?” Penny 23 asked, searching the room for an answer.

“No, I’m definitely _for_ ,” Eliot said quickly. “All in favor?”

Everyone raised their hands.

*

“So, um, I’m going to-- I’m going to go to sleep,” Quentin announced to nobody in particular, a few hours later. Julia, Alice, Margo, and Penny 23 turned to look at him from where they were drawing a map of Castle Blackspire on the floor of Kady’s living room. Eliot was dozing on the couch.

“Okay,” Julia smiled wanly.

“You deserve it, Q,” Alice said.

“Well, so do you,” Quentin said awkwardly, gesturing to all of them. “This can wait until the morning, can’t it?”

Penny 23 looked sideways at the rest of them. “Unless Irene McAllistair shows up before dawn,” he responded. Julia threw him a look.

“She-- she probably won’t,” Alice said meekly.

Penny 23 shrugged. “I’m not willing to risk it,” he said, “But I didn’t almost die today.” He looked meaningfully back at Eliot. “For once,” he added under his breath.

Margo mouthed a message silently at Quentin. _Wake him up!_ Quentin shook his head.

 _Let him sleep,_ he mouthed back.

Eliot cracked an eye open. “I know when I’m being discussed,” he said languidly, gaze flicking between Quentin and Margo. “Where are the bedrooms in this place?” His tone was nonchalant, but Quentin felt a thrill down his spine.

“I’m sure Quentin can show you,” Julia said, trying to hide a smile. She bit her lip to keep from grinning wider. “Q?”

Margo winked at him as Eliot got up to follow Quentin from the living room. Quentin rolled his eyes at her. “Okay,” he said. “We get it.”

Eliot and Quentin exchanged a look, then bid their goodnights. To their credit, no one but Margo batted an eye as they left the space and ascended the steps to the second level of Kady’s loft.

“Um,” Quentin started, his voice hoarse, as he gestured to the doors lining the short upper hallway. “There’s sort of, maybe, I don’t know, four or five rooms-- we’ve kind of just been sleeping wherever, everyone’s sleep schedule has been… pretty fucked up, to be honest, it’s been a weird… a weird few weeks…” Eliot watched him stammer, delighted. They were both alive. Quentin still had the capacity to be nervous, and deeply adorable. Life was wonderful and a hilarious for a tiny, shining moment. “Uh…” Quentin drifted off, unable to meet Eliot’s heated gaze. He’d stopped in the doorframe of a white-walled bedroom, the door half-open. The bed inside was unmade, its white sheets and slate gray comforter askew. “This is where, uh, this is where I’ve been sleeping.” He leaned against the door, aiming for casual and falling slightly short. His eyes lingered on Eliot’s collarbone, and Eliot moved closer to him, resting a hand above his shoulder and leaning down.

“Ah,” Eliot said, nodding in mock-formality. “And where will I be sleeping?”

Quentin huffed a little laugh and Eliot’s heart clenched in his chest. He ducked out from under Eliot’s arm and strode into the bedroom, taking off his shirt as he went to the bed. He toed off his shoes and got under the covers, waiting for Eliot to follow him. “Wherever you want,” he said, turning over to face the wall away from where Eliot stood.

Eliot smiled at Quentin’s back, recognizing the challenge for what it was. _Be braver_ , he told himself. He had promised.

He slowly walked to the side of the bed and watched Quentin pretending to ignore him for a few seconds. Then he took off the odd black cardigan he’d been wearing since god knows when, and the horrible, stained tee-shirt beneath it that he didn’t recognize as anything he’d own. “I can’t believe you let him dress me like this,” he muttered bitterly to Quentin’s bare back, as he shucked the last of the clothes the Monster had been wearing. He was standing beside the bed naked, though Quentin wasn’t looking, his face still turned to the wall. Eliot felt wildly vulnerable, but also much more himself now that he was out of that awful outfit. He wondered where _his_ clothes were, but the thought didn’t linger long. Quentin turned over and caught his gaze.

“Oh,” Quentin said, his voice small, taking in the sight of Eliot standing naked beside the bed. “Aren’t you cold?” he asked finally.

“Very,” Eliot said, and crawled in beside him, pulling the coverlet up over his shoulders until he could feel the heat radiating off Quentin beside him. They weren’t quite touching, but Eliot could hear Quentin’s breath catch in his throat. Their eyes met.

“Listen, Q,” Eliot started, “I know you know, but I was being stupid, before.” He waited, wondering if Quentin had anything to say to that, but Quentin’s gaze just held his, in that brazen way he sometimes had. Eliot cleared his throat. “I had a lot of time to think about it, obviously, and I-- I told myself if I got the chance, I’d tell you I was wrong, and I’m sorry.”

Quentin kept staring at him. Eliot’s heart was breaking all over again in the silence.

“I was an idiot,” he went on, suddenly flushed with the fear he was repeating himself. “I’m trying to tell you, I made a mistake, before, when you asked--”

Quentin smiled then, a radiant half-smile, his eyes lighting up in a way Eliot hadn’t seen in months, or maybe longer. “Prove it,” he said simply, lips quirking as he watched Eliot suffer.

Eliot kissed him again, pushing his tongue through Quentin’s smirk and gripping the side of his face with an intensity that surprised them both. Quentin immediately jerked and pressed his entire body against Eliot’s, pulling them together so that their chests and hips and legs were aligned, moving mindlessly against each other.

“Good start,” Quentin panted, breaking away to catch his breath. “I practically believe you.”

“Are you planning to punish me for the rest of our lives?” Eliot asked half-seriously, searching Quentin’s face for signs of anger or resentment. He didn’t find any; Quentin looked almost deliriously happy.

“Thinking about it,” Quentin teased, moving his hands down to graze Eliot’s cock, which jerked embarrassingly at the attention. Quentin pressed closer. “Is this okay?” he asked, suddenly sincere. He wrapped one hand around Eliot, the other grabbing his hip for balance. They were both absurdly tired, and Quentin’s pants were still on. Eliot cast a spell, partly to see if he could, and Quentin huffed a laugh as his jeans slid off and down to the foot of the bed.

“You cannot imagine how okay,” Eliot replied, forcing himself to keep his eyes open so he could watch every emotion that crossed Quentin’s face, until Quentin buried his face against Eliot’s shoulder. “Q?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” came Quentin’s voice, from somewhere under Eliot’s jaw. He kissed the top of Quentin’s head, trying to reassure him, then groaned suddenly as the rhythm between them changed. He put his hand over Quentin’s to still him.

“Maybe we should stop,” Eliot said, even though stopping was the last thing he wanted to do. “We had… kind of a long day.”

Quentin shrugged, then sort of shifted his weight until he’d pushed Eliot on his back. Eliot choked back a gasp as Quentin sat up and straddled him. “Okay,” he said, rolling his hips. “Yeah, I mean, why would we keep going? It’s just--” Eliot let a moan escape his hips. Quentin was unforgivably good at this, and this was nothing. “It’s just all I’ve been thinking about--”

“You wanted to rescue me just so you could get laid?” Eliot asked archly. He waited a beat while Quentin looked at him, uncertain of whether to answer truthfully. “Listen, that kind of effort deserves a reward.”

A dark flush spread over Quentin’s face, then down his neck. He bent down to Eliot’s ear, but instead of saying anything he sucked the lobe into his mouth and bit it lightly. Then he kissed down Eliot’s jaw and neck and chest until Eliot was shifting uncomfortably beneath him, clearly not used to ceding control of the situation. Quentin bent down to take Eliot in his mouth, and he tried with everything in him to stay quiet, not wanting to give himself away so easily. He fisted the sheets instead of Quentin’s hair and drank in the sight of Quentin’s head between his legs. After a moment, Eliot ran a hand experimentally through his friend’s hair and wondered at the little shocked shiver that thrilled beneath his fingers.

Quentin pulled off and looked up at Eliot with those bright, sad eyes, running his hands over Eliot’s thighs and abdomen with obvious pleasure. “You didn’t think I really wanted you,” he said softly, his gaze a playful accusation.

“No—“ Eliot started to protest, unsure of what to say for one of the few times in his life, but Quentin just silenced him with a suddenly fierce look.

“I want to convince you,” he said, biting his lip and pushing his hair out of his eyes as he looked up at his friend.

“You don’t have to,” Eliot replied, sitting up on his elbows and moving slightly so they were facing each other on the bed.

“Eliot,” Quentin said, his voice a little strangled. “I’m not going to beg unless… unless you want me to beg.”

Eliot choked on nothing and tried to cover it. “I didn’t know those were my options,” he said hoarsely, hiding a smile. He kissed Quentin again and pushed him gently so he was laying on his back. Eliot took a moment to appreciate the visual, then leaned over him and kissed his collarbone. For some reason, it looked especially delicious, and he realized with another small thrill of surprise that wanted to be tender with Quentin, he wanted to be... _romantic_. It was a bizarre feeling.

They’d done things like this in Fillory, but that was a different lifetime. Eliot wanted to take his time, to take everything in slowly, to savor the fact this was _finally happening_ , but Quentin was grinding up against him. “Eager,” Eliot said hotly, shuddering against him. “Q, slow down.”

“No, no way,” Quentin answered, burying his forehead in Eliot’s chest and pushing up against him. He whispered a spell in Latin Eliot recognized. Eliot huffed out a chuckle.

“Where did you pick that up?” Eliot said, hitching his hips so that they were rubbing slickly against one another in earnest. He reached out a hand to grab Quentin’s cock and stroked him gently, too gently, knowing he was being a tease.

“From you, at the mosaic,” Quentin gasped beneath him, jerking in tight little bursts into his hand. Eliot leaned down as he worked his hands between them faster. He kissed under Quentin’s jaw and sucked at the pulse beating there, happy to be alive. “Wait, fuck,” Quentin was wrapping his legs around Eliot’s hips, trying to get them impossibly closer together, and then he was coming with a tiny _sorry_ over Eliot’s fist and chest and onto his own abdomen.

  
“Oh,” Eliot said, growing suddenly still. He looked down at Quentin until the latter opened his eyes to meet his gaze. “You… don’t have to be sorry.” Quentin quirked a small smile up at him, breath still slowing down, and watched hungrily as Eliot stroked himself off.

“I want you to fuck me,” Quentin confessed hoarsely, wrapping his fingers over Eliot’s on his cock. Eliot moaned at that and let Quentin take over, bracing his hands down on either side of Quentin’s shoulders as he came messily into his fist.

“You don’t even know,” Eliot said quietly, nonsensically, still moving against Quentin. “Oh, god,” he dropped his head to Quentin’s chest, kissing it feverishly, “Oh, my god, I actually have to tell you, I am actually going to say the words--” he sat up, laughing a little at himself. “Quentin, I am…” he cleared his throat. “I might actually be completely in love with you, just--” he gestured miserably at the air, “--to a degree I find morbidly humiliating.” He was smiling, but Quentin heard a rare nervousness in the declaration. It was, he realized, maybe the first time he’d ever heard Eliot be unsure of himself.

Quentin wiped his hand on the sheets and sat up, waiting for Eliot to kiss him. Eliot was having trouble meeting his eyes. “El,” he said, “Come on, look at me.” _Be braver_ , Eliot thought to himself, and he looked up into Quentin’s warm gaze. “Please never get possessed again,” Quentin said seriously, and the tension was broken, and they were laughing, and Eliot did kiss him then.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Repossession](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18103415) by [ausgezeichnet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ausgezeichnet/pseuds/ausgezeichnet)




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